Nearly there!!!

Well it's that time of year again!! The start of the 2013 season is about to begin, condition couldn't be better! The river is sitting at 3ft on the Bridge pool gauge, the water is running clear and the wind has dropped.

                        
                                                                     The Potarch bridge a week ago

 

And this how it looks today. Perfect!!!

 

We have a lot of snow in the hills which will be good for the river levels if we can hold on to it until late spring.

The opening ceremony will be again at Ballogie at the Bridge pool and will start at 10.30am we are expecting around 250 people to attend the ceremony, I will do a full report tomorrow with lots of photos from the event.

 

The Marquee ready for the big day

 

 

 

 A bit of fun

Winter Work!

No doubt everyone will be relieved to see that the blog is back up and running!!!
I had lots of you messaging me why the blog stopped in July, the reason being I just didn't have time to do everything!!!! My fly-tying business has taken off in a big way and I had to give up something, unfortunately it was the blog, there wasn't enough hours in the day but hopefully this season I can continue throughout the season even if it's just a weekly report in the summer.

                                       Ian Fraser making a start on the new fence at the Bridge pool Ballogie

New season = Lots of news.........

As usual we have been busy on the riverbanks, however the weather hasn't really helped us out very much! Heavy rain and high water doesn't make for great conditions when working on the banks but we managed a week after the Christmas and New Year break and then the snow started! We had 17" in 1 day so, again, we had to abandon riverbank work.

                                     The bank at Commonty just above the Garden pool before we started work.

And the finished job! This bit will be good in very high water. The fish lie in close to our side and before we did this it was a very tricky wade to get out past the leaning trees so you could cast safely without hitting the overhanging branches.

Warmer evenings

                                  A nice Grisle goes back!

Today the air temperature pushed past 20c, it's been a long time since we had a warm evening for some Sea-trout fishing! Hopefully tonight we can get some good sport and get a few in the book, we are hugely down on numbers and need to catch up to our averages.

                George Kuczera with a sea-liced fish from Rossicks

There could be a fly in the ointment however, as with warm temperatures comes the chance of thunder storms!!! The river has just dropped to a good level for all the beats and the peat stain has all but gone, the last thing we need is a lot more rain and a rising river.

As far as this weeks catches are concerned, it's been a good start, Carlogie is leading the way again and is already into double figures and it has now overtaken Ballogie as the top beat on the river for catches, could this year be the year Carlogie beats Ballogie!!!

Double the 5 year average!!!

 Kevin Fraser with a good fish from the Bend pool at Commonty caught on one of my Cascade Snaelda doubles.

Carlogie has had another great week!! finishing with total of 17 salmon and Grilse for the week, this brings the total for June for Carlogie to 54, compared with an 5 year average catch for June of 25 which is more than double the average!!

   Rob Bull with a fish from Rossicks pool Carlogie, this was caught at 3ft 3" on the gauge!!

The Ballogie beats produced 24 salmon for the week with Richard Newtons party landing 19 for their week at Carlogie and Ballogie, had the river levels behaved we could of had a much better week. Sea-trout catches have been poor due to the conditions but I'm sure if it ever stops raining we could see a big catch of Sea-trout, as I'm writing this the rain is as hard as ever and we may yet again get a rising river for the start of the new week.

"Singing in the rain"

High Water!

 Nice Grilse covered in sea-lice, caught on a Willie Gunn Snaelda

The high water from last week has helped move new fish into the Ballogie beats, we're catching lots of fish with long tailed sea-lice including a good number of Grilse, this is a pleasent suprise as for the last few years they have been coming in August. A good mixture of summer salmon are being caught with the biggest so far weighing in at 16lbs, the water height is proving difficult to access the more traditional low water pools but the high water pools are producing fish with again Alans pool providing good sport.

Ready for landing at Alans pool

With rain appearing in the weather forcast most days this week, hopefully we can have a pretty level river height rather than a up and down river, this will settle the fish in the pools and make it easier for the anglers.

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More great catches

                                   15lber from the Top Gannets

Another great week for the Ballogie beats, 31 salmon and 10 Sea-trout were landed by the rods this week, the largest was an 18lb fish from the New pool at Ballogie. we should of had a lot more than this but we couldn't hold on to them, one rod reported 9 for his week with a further 9 lost and too many takes to count.

Robin Kemp with his largest fish to date.

Had the river not come up due to the storm we had on thursday them who nows how many fish we would of landed, as the river dropped we saw lots of new fish in the pools and landed Salmon with long tailed lice on Saturday. Hopefully the river will drop slowly this week and with the teams we have the scores should be high.

Superb catches

 A Good fish from the Flats pool at Ballogie caught today on a Franc N Snaelda in murky water

A good run of fresh fish has arrived at the Ballogie beats this week, in 2 days the beats have reported 15 Salmon and 5 sea-trout with lots of fish played and lost, Carlogie is leading the way with 10 Salmon so far!

A stunning Salmon caught at Commonty

These catches have now moved Carlogie into second place behind Ballogie for the most fish caught so far this year on the whole river. The fish are spead though the pools but as the water is now dropping they are moving into the more streamier runs, Carlogie has to be one of the most productive low water beats in Scotland